CRYONICS AND ORTHODOXY

The following essay was reprinted from CHRISTIANITY TODAY, 12, 816 (May
10, 1968), with the permission of the author.

In the latest Our Man Flint film dubiously honored as an American cultural
export by voice-dubbing into French, the bad guys (in this case gals -- an international
political conspiracy of women) try to freeze the good guys, rendering them harmless
for now but subject to potential usefulness years (or centuries) later. Observing
the products of this biological cold storage, our hero remarks: "It's not exactly
the classic idea of immortality."

But it is a limited kind of immortality -- and far from being merely a science-fiction
stunt or a gimmick to absorb footage in a B-grade film, cryonics (the technical
name of the field) is a reality. Important publications dealing with the topic
are appearing (the most comprehensive in English is R.C.W. Ettinger's The
Prospect of Immortality); some nonprofit organizations have affiliated to
form the Cryonics Societies of America (a national conference took place at
the New York Academy of Sciences in March [1968]); some funeral homes have installed
cryogenic equipment; cryonic "ambulance" units are in the offing; and already
several people are in storage.

The basic principle of cryogenic interment is simplicity itself. On the basis
of successful experimental freezing and reanimation of lower animals such as
rotifera and organs of higher animals such as chicken hearts, cryonics advocates
propose the cooling of a human body to liquid nitrogen temperature (-321°F)
-- or later, when more sophisticated permanent installations become feasible,
to liquid helium temperature (-449°F) -- thereby storing the person at the
time of "death" or at a terminal stage of illness so as to permit his resuscitation
later, when medical knowledge has learned how to cope with his disease and to
restoring the damage his body has suffered.

As a consequence of increasingly extensive transplant operations today, organ
culture and regeneration in the foreseeable future, and the definite possibility
of rejuvenation techniques and of artificial genetic improvement through control
of gene patterns (affecting both body and mind), there is every chance that
physicians of the future will be in a position not only to revive the clinically
dead or near-dead person of today but even to improve his life over what it
was at its highest point during his original earthly existence. From such possibilities,
flights of fancy readily take off; think, for example, what a relatively modest
estate would be worth three centuries from now (at compound interest) when recovered
by its newly awakened owner!

Bankers can be left to worry about the juicy financial aspects of cryonic suspension,
and the scientists have their work cut out for them. What about the theological
question? Is cryogenic storage legitimate, and if legitimate is it in fact desirable
for the Christian?

Some "orthodox" objections to cryonics can be hypothesized -- and readily answered:

1. "Cryogenic interment is not even mentioned, much less advocated, in the
Bible." But though everything the Bible teaches or touches is veraciously
revelatory, one cannot conclude that the Bible contains all truth! The Bible
is not a cosmic Encyclopaedia Britannica; cryonics would be objectionable
only if it violated biblical teaching.

2. "Cryonics is against the will of God; if he had meant us to live longer
he would have given us the natural power to do so." But the same argument
could be applied to the airplane: "If the Lord had wanted us to fly, he would
have put wings on our backs."

3. "Cryonics would presumptively alter man's basic character through gene
manipulation and surgical rejuvenation." But in biblical revelation man is
defined in his relationship to God, not in terms of his physical or mental
characteristics; thus Dr. Blaiberg, with Clive Haupt's heart, is no less a
person, responsible before God, than he was before his "alteration."

4. "Cryonics is anthropocentric -- glorifying mortal man as a Faust rather
than the eternal God, 'who only hath immortality.'" Although this argument
has superficial cogency -- and is aided and abetted by admittedly non-Christian
cryonics writers in the religious domain (e.g., R.C.W. Ettinger, in The
Christian Century, Oct. 4, 1967) -- the fact is that cryonics, like all
other technical scientific accomplishments from automobiles to atomic power,
can be used either to man's glory (and thus his destruction) or to God's glory.

5. "We should want to get to heaven fast, not remain on a sinful earth."
But note carefully the Apostle's words (they should become the sedes doctrinae
for orthodox Christian cryonics): "I have a desire to depart, and to be with
Christ, which is far better; nevertheless to abide in the flesh is more needful
for you." (Phil. 1:23,24). Here Paul opts for earth, not because it is better
than heaven (far from it!) but because the preaching of the Gospel is so desperately
needed here. This, needless to say, is justification enough for extending
one's time of earthly service to Christ.

In point of fact, orthodox believers have not responded negatively to the cryonics
program. Quite the opposite, as illustrated by the impressive sermon on the
subject delivered by Lutheran pastor Kay Glaesner in 1965. Said he: "Christianity
and the church have always been interested in the extension of human life. .
. . The church of Christ does not retard science." (The Christian Century,
Oct. 27, 1965).

Rather, it has been mainline theologians of mediating neo-orthodox and existentialist
leanings who have excoriated the idea. Joseph Sittler of Chicago, for example,
has called the concept an "exalted form of madness," owing to its "radically
nonhistorical concept of what a human life is": to extract man, a "profoundly
historical being," from his existential setting is to destroy him (Time,
Sept. 30, 1966). Here is an excellent example of the genuinely reactionary nature
of existentially grounded theology: man is defined by categories ("historicity")
that arbitrarily prohibit his legitimate activity. (One is reminded of Denis
de Rougemont's wholly appropriate blast, in his Meanings of Europe, at
Sartre's comparable political pessimism.) Contemporary theology, no longer subjecting
itself to revelational perspective, is perpetually subject to a non-revelational
"hardening of categories" of the most reactionary kind.

Just as it was orthodox believer C.S. Lewis who took space travel seriously
and faced in depth the theological question of human contact with other intelligent
creatures, while liberals were engaged in obscurantist documentary criticism
and political demonstrations, so it will be (I'll wager) the truly progressive
evangelical theologians who develop serious theologies of cryonics. And they
have the most to gain. Personally, I would gladly have chipped in to defray
the costs of eventually resuscitating Warfield, Machen, Pieper, or Lewis, had
cryogenic interment been around at the time of their clinical deaths. I shudder
to think what they -- or the Fathers or the Reformers -- would say when faced
with today's secular theology.

I'm for cryonics: the future could well gain from those in the present who
have come experientially to acknowledge the absolute lordship of the Christ
of Scripture.